hoe
noun
a long-handled implement having a thin, flat blade usually set transversely, used to break up the surface of the ground, destroy weeds, etc.
hoe
1 American
[hoh]
/ hoʊ /
noun
-
hoes
plural
-
a long-handled implement having a thin, flat blade usually set transversely, used to break up the surface of the ground, destroy weeds, etc.
-
any of various implements of similar form, as for mixing plaster or mortar.
verb (used with object)
-
hoes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hoed,
past participle, past
-
hoeing
present participle
verb (used without object)
-
hoes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hoed,
past participle, past
-
hoeing
present participle
Hoe
2
American
[hoh]
/ hoʊ /
noun
-
Richard, 1812–86, U.S. inventor and manufacturer of printing-press equipment.
-
his father Robert, 1784–1833, U.S. manufacturer of printing presses.
hoe
British
/ həʊ /
noun
verb
hoe
Idioms
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
hoesimple
-
hoessimple
-
have hoedperfect
-
has hoedperfect
-
am hoeingprogressive
-
are hoeingprogressive
-
is hoeingprogressive
-
have been hoeingperfect progressive
-
has been hoeingperfect progressive
Past
-
hoedsimple
-
had hoedperfect
-
was hoeingprogressive
-
were hoeingprogressive
-
had been hoeingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hoe
First recorded in 1325–75; Middle English howe, from Old French houe, from Germanic; compare Middle Dutch houwe, Old High German houwa “mattock”; akin to hew
Explanation
A hoe is a gardening tool made up of a long handle with a sharp metal blade at the end, used to stab the ground and loosen it. Hoe can be a noun or a verb, so you can use your hoe to remove weeds from a lawn, or you can hoe your garden and make it ready to plant. The word shares the same root as hew, which is a verb that means "to strike, chop, or cut." The “oe” seems tricky, but remember that it never changes, and even if you’re hoeing with three hoes in grass you hoed yesterday, the hoe stays the same.
Vocabulary lists containing hoe
The Circuit
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Elijah of Buxton
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Shiloh
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Because of TV streaming platforms and other factors, he said, "in my take of things, it's going to be a very rough road to hoe now."
From Barron's ● Oct. 11, 2025
Family, activists and observers displayed a five-foot-long hula hoe, a type of gardening tool that has a metal D-shaped fixture on the end for digging into dirt, that Gainer held when he was shot.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 21, 2024
"This will be a hard row to hoe, given that this same jury is daily receiving new evidence that the defendant, outside the courtroom, continues to spread the lie undeterred," Ms Jones said.
From BBC ● Jan. 25, 2024
I got the transcripts from the hearings and basically they said "This will kill jobs. This will destroy agriculture, if you create a long-handled hoe."
From Salon ● Oct. 29, 2023
She visited the ruins of the Seymour house daily, waiting for them to cool enough so that she could poke through the ash with a hoe, in search of coin or melted silver.
From "Chains" by Laurie Halse Anderson
David Badham, general manager at Central Convenience on Walker Terrace near where the woman was found on West Hoe Road, said staff heard "screams" and people asking for an ambulance.
From BBC ● Jan. 23, 2025
“She’s the global phenomenon right now and she’s representing Taiwan,” said Benson Hu, 31, who has been doing drag in Taiwan for three years as Sandra Hoe.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 1, 2024
“Singapore is a victim of its own success,” said Leong Hoe Nam, an infectious diseases expert at the city’s Mount Elizabeth Hospital.
From Reuters ● Dec. 23, 2020
The incident happened on Hoe Avenue Thursday in the middle of the afternoon.
From Fox News ● Sep. 13, 2020
Washington added, “That this Fellow is both a Rogue & Runaway...I shall not pretend to deny—But that he is exceedingly healthy, strong, and good at the Hoe, the whole neighbourhood can testifie.”
From "In the Shadow of Liberty" by Kenneth C. Davis
Rescuers used what tools they could scrounge — shovels, hoes, pickaxes, their bare hands.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 9, 2026
It can turn a century-old maker of back hoes and mining trucks into a hot tech stock.
From Barron's ● Jan. 13, 2026
Officers were seen using rakes and hoes, strimmers and a small excavator to clear paths through the scrub on a nearby slope - the sound of machinery at work audible in the remote area.
From BBC ● May 25, 2023
The suspects allegedly used small handheld trowels, shovels, rakes and hoes, and used buckets and backpacks to take items away from the site.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 15, 2022
To do this, we dug mini-holes in the ground using hoes.
From "A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier" by Ishmael Beah
"But it's temporary," she sighed, standing barefoot in her freshly hoed soil.
From Barron's ● Nov. 26, 2025
The Renegades hoed a tougher road, squeaking into the playoffs in the final week with a 4-6 record.
From Washington Times ● May 10, 2023
They harvested grapes in California, hoed sugar beets in Nebraska and picked cherries, peaches, pears and apples in Washington State.
From New York Times ● Nov. 23, 2020
African American slaves plowed, planted, hoed, picked, and “ginned” most of this valuable crop.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
Here they meandered in their tiny sailboats, tacking and coming about; they painted, hoed, swept, and planted when the mood for therapeutic work struck them, and lolled on the beach when they felt like it.
From "Snow Falling on Cedars: A Novel" by David Guterson
The last stretch of the journey to Cynthia takes me along a dirt track, past meandering cattle, a man hoeing his vegetable patch, and groups of women and children returning from church.
From BBC ● May 25, 2024
A detailed analysis of five gardening activities — digging, hoeing, raking, troweling and weeding — found that gardening uses a variety of both upper- and lower-body muscles.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 22, 2022
Like slaves and servants, poor free women performed hard field labor like hoeing and reaping.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
The bad news is that there’s nothing especially intense or inventive here, no sign that short fiction is the fertile row Eugenides should have been hoeing all along.
From New York Times ● Oct. 3, 2017
“There is nothing in the house until nightfall,” she said briefly, and without speech she took the furrow to the left of him and fell into steady hoeing.
From "The Good Earth" by Pearl S. Buck
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
